Molly narrowly escapes a concussion. Her shopping is not so lucky. Sirius isn't sure he is, either.
The chapter title means, approximately, 'homelike troubles.'
"That book," he said to Remus, abruptly, while they attacked a doxy nest. "Good one, Moony."
Remus turned to look at him, sidelong, giving nothing away.
"You must have been beyond furious," he tried. "Don't blame you."
"I was," Remus agreed, mildly. "Eventually."
Because Wormy had been so very convincing. A spill of red threatened his vision; he blinked it back. "So, good one." Good prank, he meant.
"You mean," Remus tried, in that ever-so special, cautious, talking-to-Sirius-when-he's-in-a-Mood tone that Sirius hates, "that it was good of me to pack up your things instead of burning them? Yes, it was rather, good of you to notice."
"No, I mean," he said, rather desperately, "I mean, yes, very good of you, but I meant slipping a picture like that into my album. Reckon you thought I deserved that. How'd you fake it?"
He can't bear the way Remus is looking at him, the slow, deep, late-autumn-oak eyes that are looking at him as though they can't decide whether to be confused or suspicious or kind as all hell. Gaily announcing his intention to deal with the salamander in the oven that's been driving Molly crazy, he scrambles away before Remus can ask which photo.
"Sirius!" Remus calls after him, trying to catch him up, but he's already collided with Snape on the landing.
Papers go everywhere, a rain of black and red ink, the occasional brief stroke of green. It's a long, long moment of surprised and endless black set in skin white with the pain of being jostled. Of noticing that, yes, that is a not-sallow tone to it again, under the grey, and what in Merlin's sagging pouches is going on with that?
A long moment of riveted, unwilling awareness that the whites of those dark eyes are blue-tinted over the smudgy (also bluish) circles, not yellowed. Porcelain, and not nicotine-stained wallpaper at all. An instant eternity of cauldron-strong hands catching him, steady and sure on his arms, despite the white knuckles and hissed breath, of aromatic woods and herbs, seeping his blood with electric thorns of cedar and agrimony, sweet fennel and spiced heather, dark oregano and sharp rosemary, thorns sliding home just as though they belonged.
All in all, he's pathetically grateful when Snape's mouth presses from a soft bruise of startlement into its accustomed tight impatience, pushes him away, pulls in a breath that looks like it hurts (and hurts in stranger ways than Sirius would really like to think about), lets it out, and starts yelling at him for being a clumsy, sotted ass.
He remains grateful even when Remus comes up from behind to make soothing yet annoyingly amused noises, Snape turns the explosion on him with uncalled for melodrama, Winky shows up in a fountain of scolding to try to rescue Master Potions Master from the big bad threadbare corduroy jacket with elbow patches, Kreacher oozes by to make snide remarks about what can only be expected of mudbloods and blood traitors, his Dear Mamma starts shrieking from the hall, and Molly stops at the bottom of the stairwell, her arms full of groceries, to demand (with complete justification) to know what the hell is going on up there, and why had she just had all her eggs crushed by a flying inkpot?
Oddly, Sirius gets the distinct feeling that it's because he does rather than doesn't have a sense of the ridiculous that Snape sniffily corrects her with a, "Falling inkwell," before gathering up his papers and the dripping ink-whatever with a swish of his wand, and swooping out grandly like an enormous (and slightly arthritic) raven. Er, vulture. Definitely vulture.
So, yes, that was short. But, hey, slapstick!